Lehigh County budget veto stands

Lehigh County tax bill in 2013, along with tax credits, will save property owners $44.

November 14, 2012|By Samantha Marcus, Of The Morning Call

Lehigh County Executive Bill Hansell's revised tax-and-spending plan for 2013 prevailed Wednesday when a bid to override his veto of a budget passed by the Board of Commissioners failed.

That means that with tax credits, the average homeowner will pay about $670, which is $44 less than this year.

Republican commissioners were one vote short of the six necessary to override Hansell's budget, which revised their own amended budget through line-item vetoes.

The vote was a choice between a board-backed budget that would cut taxes by $5 million and spending by $5 million, and Hansell's counter-proposal that cuts spending by $3.5 million and taxes by $3 million. Both plans would use tax credits to save the average taxpayer $44.

"The taxpayers will pay exactly the same under each scenario," said Hansell, a Democrat.

Hansell earlier this month drew on his broad veto powers to strike down the Republican commissioners' amended budget, which he said was "unachievable and unsustainable." His revised budget helped line up four votes to assure his veto would be upheld.

The veto's fate rested largely with Commissioners Brad Osborne and Percy Dougherty, Republicans who worked with Hansell to craft what they considered a more measured bill that still cuts taxes and spending, but to a lesser extent. Just $1.5 million in spending cuts separated the two plans.

Republican Commissioner Scott Ott on Wednesday morning appealed to supporters by radio and email to collectively nudge Osborne and Dougherty to change their votes, override the veto and support the $5 million-cut budget.

"Your Republican commissioners need to hear your voice," Ott implored in an email. "Next year is an election year, and your expectations should be clear."

But Osborne and Dougherty established early in the meeting that their support for the plan with the $3.5 million cut was firm.

All commissioners held to their positions. A bloc of five Republicans — Ott, Vic Mazziotti, Lisa Scheller, Michael Schware and Tom Creighton — voted to override. Two Democrats — Dan McCarthy and David Jones —joined forces with Osborne and Dougherty to stop them.

Defending his vote, Osborne argued that Hansell's revised budget makes measured cuts and addresses the county's structural deficit while also stopping historical year-over-year spending increases. The administration has argued that more reckless cuts, without the benefit of tax base growth, would hurl the county toward a tax increase in 2014 or 2015.

"I fear that if we have major tax cuts, if we do not bring spending under control, in 2015 we'll have the tax increase of all tax increases," Dougherty said.

The 2013 budget wrangling has left a fractured Board of Commissioners, wounded by threats and competing priorities.

Osborne's and Dougherty's opposition to the GOP's amended budget drew criticism from members of the bloc. Mazziotti chastised them for collaborating on Hansell's counteroffer without informing the caucus.

"It's clear to me we cannot count on them to work with us," he said last week.

The GOP bloc and conservative reform slate had campaigned on promises of rolling back recent tax increases and scaling down the size of county government. Hansell's original budget included a $6.5 million tax credit but no permanent tax reduction.

That reform slate — Ott, Scheller and Mazziotti — joined with Schware and Creighton to form a conservative bloc pushing for deeper tax cuts.

Mazziotti said the bloc had nothing to lose by attempting to override the veto. Hansell's revised budget cuts taxes and the bloc's budget would have reduced them further.

Schware called the plan with the $3.5 million cut a political calculation that is the bare minimum necessary to secure enough votes to hold off an override.

"The executive's veto is not the best deal on the table for the taxpayers," he said.

This is the board's second vote on a veto override this year. In February, commissioners reauthorized a countywide reassessment over then-Executive Don Cunningham's veto and objections that the market was too chaotic.